Even after Tea Party Nation founder Judson Phillips’ scheme to elect Mitt Romney president through the electoral college was debunked, the idea continues to gain traction with some reality challenged tea partiers.

The 12th Amendment of the Constitution as well as Article II of the Constitution govern the Electoral College.

According to the 12th Amendment, for the Electoral College to be able to select the president, it must have a quorum of two-thirds of the states voting. If enough states refuse to participate, the Electoral College will not have a quorum. If the Electoral College does not have a quorum or otherwise cannot vote or decide, then the responsibility for selecting the president and vice president devolves to the Congress.

The House of Representatives selects the president and the Senate selects the vice president.

Since the Republicans hold a majority in the House, presumably they would vote for Mitt Romney, and the Democrats in the Senate would vote for Joe Biden for vice president.

Can this work?

Sure it can.”

Turns out he misread the 12th Amendment (who could blame him – it’s not like it was the 2nd Amendment or something REALLY important!), so badly in fact that even World Net Daily was forced to admit that no, Virginia, there is no insanity clause. Yet, as with all things far-right related these days, the Zombie Idiocalypse just WILL. NOT. DIE:

Philips’ incorrect reading of the 12th Amendment has found new life in the dark subculture of right wing chain emails. One of these chain emails found their way into the inbox of Idaho state Sen. Sheryl Nuxoll, who is urging states to boycott the Electoral College, so that Romney can win the presidency. When Nuxoll was told that Philips had it all wrong, and the scheme to boycott the Electoral College won’t work, she said, “Well, I guess that’s one lawyer. She later went on to tell the Idaho Statesman that, “I think it is very, very sad that we elected our current president, because he is definitely not following (the) Constitution. He is depriving us of our freedoms by all the agencies, and so … what I’m thinking is the states are going to have to stand up for our individual rights and for our collective rights.”

For a group of people who spend most of their time screaming about the Constitution, they don’t seem to have any idea of what’s really in it, or what it means. Or apparently, how to spell it:

At work, because I didn’t want to spoil the “surprise” my coworkers have planned.

It doesn’t feel any different (chasing jets for a number of years has had me feeling waaaaay older than 50 for quite some time now), but it sure sounds funny.

Guess I’ll check out the invite AARP sent me – need to find out if they’re the good guys or if they’ve gone all Nathan Bedford Forrest what with the Muslin Usurper in the White House (insert ululations here).